Cops bust internet scammers, arrest local woman and her five Nigerian lovers

KUALA LUMPUR: Police busted a "internet parcel scam" syndicate after arresting five Nigerian nationals and their lover who allegedly bore several of their children.

The 42-year-old Malaysian national, who has been the lover of all five of the syndicate members, is said to have borne 12 children with several different fathers and has worked for the syndicate impersonating government and bank officials to scam their victims.

The woman, who also worked as a bank account holder for the syndicate, also admitted to allegedly receiving RM1.5mil to RM2mil of transaction into her bank account while working for the syndicate.

Bukit Aman Commercial Crime Investigations Department (CCID) deputy director (intelligence and operations) Senior Asst Comm Datuk Jalil Hassan said that the suspects were arrested in several spots in the Klang Valley during an operation on Thursday with police seizing 14 bank account books, 21 ATM cards, 10 handphones and several other items.

"Our initial investigations revealed that all five of the Nigerian suspects were in Malaysia on student visas," he told a press conference at the Federal CCID headquarters in Bukit Perdana here yesterday.

He added that nine others including six women, who were working for the syndicate as bank account holders were also arrested.

SAC Jalil said all the suspects, aged between 26 and 39, have been remanded to facilitate investigation following the arrests made on Thursday.

He added police got a lead on the syndicate when a 60-year-old Singaporean woman who lived in Johor Bharu was duped into parting with RM566,590.93 by a syndicate member who led her into believing that she would receive a parcel containing 750,000 sterling pounds.

"They had met in Facebook in July last year. The syndicate member was impersonating an Irish man who was interested in the victim," he said adding that the syndicate member then told the victim he had sent a parcel to her home in Johor Bharu through courier service.

"The victim then received an email saying that the parcel has already arrived at customs but she would have to pay transaction and insurance fees for the parcel to claim it. Believing his sweet talk and promises, he said the woman had deposited money into several local bank accounts," said SAC Jalil adding that the victim deposited the money in 12 different transactions in to 12 different accounts amounting to RM566,590.93.

After the last transaction was made, the woman realised that she had been duped as the parcel never arrived, forcing her to lodge a police report on Jan 21.

SAC Jalil said investigation also revealed that syndicate members would pay between four to five percent of the total transaction to the account holders to open local bank accounts.

He added that police believe that the syndicate has been operating for two to three years and has duped more than RM7mil.

"We will continue our investigation. We hope that people would not trust others that they meet on the internet easily," he added.

An insurance broker received a rude shock when she lost more than RM1mil in an Internet scam.

The woman, identified only as Lim, 47, gave RM1,021,000 in total to Kevin Axcel Brown @ Joe, whom she “met” in an online matchmaking site in September.

Joe claimed he was a 48-year-old Canadian chemical engineer with Petronas in Tereng­ganu and had used different telephone numbers to communicate.

MCA’s Public Services and Complaints Department head Datuk Michael Chong said most cases of Internet fraud involved promises of joint business ventures and marriage.

“There have been 13 cases of Internet fraud this year and nine of the victims were female.

“None of them had seen their scammers’ faces and yet could fall in love with them,” Chong added.

Joe had asked Lim for a RM1mil loan last October to settle his financial troubles and she deposited it into three different bank accounts registered under the name of Zanariah.

He then said he was abroad, but asked her to meet him at KLIA on Dec 7.

She waited for four hours in vain.

She had also transferred an extra US$7,000 (RM21,000) for Joe’s travel expenses.

Besides her savings, Lim had also borrowed from friends, family and financial organisations to raise the RM1mil.

Chong advised the public to be more careful as scammers had developed new tactics to con their victims.

“They show fake approval letters and even tap into an organisation’s phone number,” he said, showing two “support letters” Joe used to convince Lim.

The case comes after reports of a new telephone scam demanding victims to give “donations” allegedly for Barisan Nasional’s election fund.

The “Bukit Aman police scam” began three weeks ago with victims receiving phone calls from a number registered under the Bukit Aman Police Headquarters.

A “Datuk Halim” from the Commercial Crime desk would inform victims of a money laundering charge against them and ask them to deposit money in an account for the election fund.

Three near-victims approached Chong, who said there had been at least eight similar cases this year.

“They claimed to be acting on the Prime Minister’s orders and asked between RM3,000 and RM5,000 from each victim,” Chong said.

Telephone scam losses amounted to more than RM1.5mil this year, while Internet fraud losses stand at RM1.8mil.

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answered on Jul 15, 2016 at 20:30by Macau Scam

24 June 2016 - theSundaily

Public advised to ignore 'Macau Scam' phone calls

JOHOR BARU: The public has been urged to ignore telephone calls from strangers who claim that their bank accounts have been used by certain criminal syndicates.

South Johor Baru Police chief ACP Sulaiman Salleh gave this advice after a woman was deceived by a syndicate known as the 'Macau Scam' last Tuesday.

The 30-year-old victim reported she received a call from an individual who introduced himself as Inspector Chia, a police officer from China at about 9am.

He said the suspect who used the phone number +862162310110 told the victim her account had been used by an international drug syndicate.

"The suspect then ordered the woman to give the last four-digit of her ATM card and to deposit RM2,500 into an account belonging to a man, to avoid arrest.

"At 2.30pm (on the same day), the victim deposited the required sum of money into a Hong Leong Bank account as provided by the suspect. The victim was then warned not to disclose the matter to anyone," he said in a statement here, Wednesday.

Sulaiman said fearing for her safety, the victim made a police report.

"The police would like to advise the public not to entertain calls from unknown overseas telephone numbers to avoid from being cheated and incurring losses.

"Members of the public are urged to contact the police if they receive such calls and advised not to make any payment because this is a fraud ring known as 'Macau Scam'," he said. — Bernama

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answered on Jul 15, 2016 at 20:37by Parcel Scam

Jul 8, 2016 - The New Paper

Teller foiled scammer who targeted woman to remit $180,000

By Arya Shree Thampuran

The elderly woman looked nervous as she entered the shop at People's Park Complex.

Accompanied by a younger woman, she said she needed to remit $180,000 to a beneficiary in China.

The younger woman also kept hurrying the staff at Hanshan Money Express Remittance.

Mr Li Shu, 36, one of the remittance tellers, felt something was amiss.

His hunch was right: The elderly woman was a victim of a parcel scam.

The younger woman, a suspect, had accompanied her to the shop to remit the money.

But thanks to Mr Li and his colleagues, the money never went through.

For foiling the scam attempt and bringing it to the attention of the police, Mr Li, a fellow remittance teller, Ms Han Gui Yuan, 46, and the director of the remittance agency, who wished to be known only as Ms K.E. Thng, won a commendation from the police yesterday.

Recalling the incident on June 24, Mr Li said he became suspicious when he heard the large sum of money the women wanted.

He told The New Paper: "Auntie (the 80-year-old victim) didn't dare to speak when I asked her questions. She was nervous."

"(The younger) woman's actions were not normal. She kept hurrying me to make the transaction," he said.

He probed them with questions about the transaction. The younger woman claimed that they were remitting money to purchase expensive Chinese medicinal herbs.

Still wary of their motives, Mr Li decided to probe further.

"(The suspect) kept asking me when the money would arrive. Because I thought the (amount) was odd, I purposely said that it would arrive only the following week to see her reaction," he said.

The two women then left after being told that the transaction would be delayed.

Mr Li discussed the incident with his more experienced colleague, Ms Han and decided to report the matter to the company's Head of Retail Operations.

SUSPICIOUS

The matter was brought to the attention of their director, Ms Thng, who tried to contact the elderly woman for more information.

She was surprised when her call was answered by the younger woman instead.

Ms Thng said: "(The suspect) asked me why I was asking her so many questions.

"She claimed to have transferred money before and that there are many other remittance companies she could patronise if we declined.

"I felt the case was very suspicious so I withheld the funds."

Ms Thng decided to alert the police, who arrived and tried in vain to contact the victim. They eventually sent her a text message.

A police spokesman told TNP that the elderly victim, a retired piano teacher, was traumatised by the scam and was wary of answering her phone.

Fortunately, the victim's brother, who lives with her, saw the message on her phone.

He took his sister to the remittance company the next day.

Police investigations later revealed that the victim had received a phone call claiming that she had an illegal parcel overseas. She was threatened with imprisonment if she did not cooperate.

She was accompanied by the 65-year-old female suspect to withdraw money from the bank, before proceeding to remit the funds.

This is not the first scam case the company has dealt with. In the past, victims have been told by scammers that they have won lotteries or lucky draws, and were tricked into parting with their money to pay "administration fees" to secure their cash prizes.

..."We hope to work closely with various stakeholders like banks and remittance companies. If they come across victims, they should inform the police," DAC Law said.

Kota Kinabalu: People have again been reminded to be wary of scammers out to cheat them of their cash and valuables.

The reminder came from Beaufort Police Chief DSP Azmir Abd Razak following the latest incident involving a self-employed woman who lost RM13,550 to scammers within four days.

The 51-year-old received a call from a woman about 9.30am on June 29, who claimed that there was an overseas package addressed to her.

The self-employed woman ignored the call and said she did not have any acquaintance from abroad.

On June 30, she again received a call from the same woman who this time claimed that she had to pay RM1,550 to obtain the package which contained cash and valuables.

This prompted the self-employed woman to transfer the cash over an automated teller machine of a bank in the district and deposited it to a bank account provided by the caller.

The self-employed received another call from the same woman on July 1, telling her that the package is being held at the Immigration and that she needed to transfer RM3,500 for easier package handling.

The woman was also told to make the cash transfer or face action being taken against her for smuggling in illegal money, prompting the woman to make the deposit out of fear.

On July 4, she received a short message from an individual claiming to be a bank officer who told her to transfer RM14,500.

The woman again deposited RM8,500 into the same bank account and only realised that something was fishing after not receiving the package until today.

Azmir said the case is being probed under Section 420 of the Penal Code for cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property.

"Please do not be easily influenced by scammers," he said.

Several cases of people getting duped into giving out their valuables and cash have been reported in the State.

In July last year, a 29-year-old civil servant was cheated into paying RM1,400 to scammers who convinced him that it was downpayment for a house in Penampang.

In March the same year, two elderly women lost their valuables to a scammer who convinced them to hand over their belongings to prevent untoward incidents while offering treatment for ailments.

"There was a lady who was cheated more than five times. Yet she continues to succumb to such love scams which I find difficult to understand, said Zambre bin Ismail, who is based in its Labuan branch.

Zambre said that in some cases, wives found that their husbands had applied for a few loans under their names.

In one case, up to eight loans without their knowledge.

Likewise, there were husbands who found that their wives had applied for a few loans using their names without their knowledge.

He advised the public to check their credit rating using the CCRIS system available at Bank Negara branches.

At the seminar on "Financial Crimes", a CCRIS checking terminal was made available for them to check on their credit status with records of their loan that have been applied for.

Zambre's talk covered financial crime that included love scams, suspicious digital currencies, pyramid schemes and unlicensed direct selling (MLM) schemes, commodities and precious metals from gold, silver and other items, promising lucrative returns on investment with testimonies of successful people who claimed to have benefited from their investments in the schemes, whether local or from overseas.

Zambre advised get rich scheme investors to do a company search on private limited companies with the Companies Commission of Malaysia to find out their nature of business, records and the people behind the business as part of their investigative due diligence before deciding to invest after checking with the authorities such as Bank Negara's list of suspicious firms. Those who are involved should get out of such schemes fast, he added, to cut their losses.

"It's better to lose RM10,000 now than RM30,000 later."

He said financial crime perpetrators target people from all walks of life, exploiting information from facebook, etc, to put panic into the minds of the victims to make them do their bidding to solve the false perceived situation or play on their greed and gullibility to gain the victims' monies.

Bank Negara is only involved with complaints on illegal deposit taking schemes and unlicensed foreign exchange trading (Forex) financial crimes. Licensed money lenders are under the State Finance Ministry while pawn shops are under the respective local government or council.

Other cheating cases are those involving the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Ministry, the police, the Securities Commission etc. He cautioned the public that dealing with overseas banks or companies forex schemes in Malaysia without licence or Bank Negara's approval is illegal and unauthorised.

He said Bank Negara's name was used by many of the financial criminals including the names of the police, customs and others like the Securities Commission.

Bank Negara, licensed commercial banks and the police do not ask for private banking information from the public, nor will they send SMS or email requesting for information. Members of the public are requested to change their passwords often and keep them confidential for internet banking.

Meanwhile, Bank Negara's Counselling and Credit Management Agency (AKPK) Sabah head Idris bin Kasim who delivered a lecture on "Financial Literacy and Wellbeing", said: a lack of financial literacy knowledge, the refusal to learn and a spendthrift lifestyle aggravate insolvency woes in the country."

From school till university, financial wisdom is not taught to students.

Hence, he called for financial literacy knowledge to be taught in educational establishments like what Bank Negara and AKPK are doing for the public.

"It also involved a lifelong habit of saving, keeping to a budget for expenses and generating alternative sources of legal income, planning to make money work for us, planning and managing debt effectively and having a risk management plan to avoid financial losses.

"Hence we need to heighten our financial literacy knowledge and life management of expenses.

"We need to control our emotional, egoistic and greedy wants from envious feelings, desires using our head to think rationally rather than succumbing to our heart's desires. "Postpone our wants, fulfil our needs.

SINGAPORE: A joint operation conducted in several Malaysian states last week yielded 27 arrested suspects believed to be involved in cross-border Internet love scam syndicates.

The operation, which took place from Feb 6 to Feb 8, was a joint effort between the Commercial Crime Investigation Department (CCID), Royal Malaysia Police, Singapore Police Force (SPF) and the Commercial Affairs Department (CAD).

Among those arrested were 11 Nigerian nationals believed to have had a hand in 108 such scams reported by victims in both Singapore and Malaysia.

The victims' total losses were estimated at around RM21.6mil, said SPF in a news release on Monday.

Telecommunications devices, computers and ATM cards were also seized during the operation.

"This marks the first successful joint investigation between the two departments against elusive criminals involved in syndicated Internet love scams," SPF added.

It added that during the course of joint investigations, the CAD provided "timely information" to the CCID, which allowed its investigators to establish the suspects' identities.

While arrest operations were ongoing in Malaysia, the CAD coordinated investigations against six female suspects in Singapore who transferred criminal proceeds to Malaysia-based suspects.

CAD director David Chew said: "The success of this joint investigation is a testament to the close ties between CAD and CCID. Online scams are increasingly complex and transnational in nature.

"To the criminals who think that they could hide behind the cloak of anonymity provided by the Internet to perpetrate fraud, we want to send a deterrent message that crime does not pay."

According to the SPF's 2016 crime statistics released last week, Internet love scams in Singapore hit an all-time high.

There were 636 cases, up from 385 in 2015. The total amount cheated was also the highest by far at $24mil (RM75mil) - double the $12mil (RM38mil) victims were fooled into giving in 2015. – The Straits Times/Asia News Network

Creepy phone calls are never welcome but if you get one asking if you can hear them, you need to put the phone down straight away…

There is a very good reason for this abrupt behaviour, as apparently, there is a major scam going round and one you do not want to risk being part of.

According to the Daily Mail, phone scammers are tricking people into answering ‘yes’ when asked if they can be heard on the phone and using it to con them.

It’s apparently a major issue in America at present, but its set to make its way over to the UK any minute now.

Their fraudulent plan involves the criminal calling from a local number and lying about a believable place of work, along with giving a fake name.

They will then ask the supposedly ‘innocent’ question of ‘Can you hear me?’ on a fully working line and await their victim to answer ‘yes.’

The scammers will record your answer of ‘yes’ and edit it into a verbal contract so they can then trick you out of large sums of money.

Horrifyingly, if you try to fight against their charges, the con-artists will play back the recording of you appearing to agree to the terms and threaten you with legal action.

Many businesses and now banks have started to use ‘voice signatures,’ to seal deals and access parts of a company over the phone, but these can be extremely risky.

A call blocking company based in the UK called CPR Call Blocker reported this sort of fraudulent activity is on the rise.

Head of Marketing for the company Kris Hicks spoke to the Sunderland Echo:

In our experience of working across the US and UK, scams spread quickly across the pond.

We have no doubt that fraudsters operating in the UK will soon start using these tactics.

Well this is reassuring…

I’d definitely heed the advice though, if someone asks ‘can you hear me?’ on the phone and they’re not your mum, hang up.

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answered on Mar 2, 2017 at 18:59by Anonymous

MCA: Chinese nationals falling prey to MLM, property scams

February 20, 2017

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 20 — Chinese nationals are becoming the target of scams in the local property sector and through various multi-level marketing (MLM) schemes.

MCA’s Public Services and Complaints Department head, Datuk Seri Michael Chong said there were claims by Chinese nationals that they were being cheated by the millions in various scams involving Malaysian businesses.

“They came to us (MCA) to seek our help, especially those who have purchased property here. We are talking about millions of ringgit being invested unknowingly in these scams.

“After buying houses here, they claimed to be cheated by the developer where in such instances, Bumiputera reserve lands were sold to them,” he told a press conference at Wisma MCA, here, today.

Chong said the deals were made in their home country and when they came to Malaysia, they realised there were no proper deals, hence they faced losses amounting to millions of ringgit.

Meanwhile, on Chinese nationals being cheated by various local MLM businesses, Chong said the number was constantly growing.

He also revealed that many Chinese nationals were convinced on the MLM deals because the names of many VIPs were misused to carry out the scams.

“They (the scammers) will offer you something where you can get super returns and many, through greed, have fallen into the trap.

In light of the scams, he advised them that there were proper guidelines to purchase property in this country and they could always enquire with their lawyers or do checks with the Malaysian embassy in their home country before getting into money deals.

“They can even enquire from us (MCA Public Services and Complaints Department) or our Malaysia-China Welfare Advisory Council which is recognised by the Chinese embassy here,” he said. — Bernama

SINGAPORE — Scammers have a new trick up their sleeves – charging gaming credits or online gift cards on their victim’s mobile phone accounts – after befriending them on Facebook.

The police said on its Facebook page on Monday (March 27) that it has received several reports of victims incurring unauthorised charges on their mobile phone bills as a result of this new scam.

Revealing the modus operandi, the police said scammers work by sending a friend request to their victims on the social networking site. In some cases, the conmen’s accounts closely resemble those of their targets’ friends.

After being accepted as a friend, the fraudster would ask for the victims’ mobile phone numbers and service providers, and use the information to make buy gaming credits online or online gift cards.

When asked for a three-digit One Time Password (OTP) verification sent to their mobiles, the victims hand over the information, only to find out after they receive their mobile phone bills that they had been cheated and charged for transactions that they did not make.

In its Facebook reminder, the police reminded the public not to share personal information including OTP or verification codes to anyone. They should also be wary of friend requests from strangers on social networking sites.

The public is also encouraged to report any fraudulent charges detected on their mobile phone bill to their mobile service provider immediately.